The Drink Cart: Cannes We Not

Let's go all in on anything interesting that may have happened in advertising's biggest history making self-congratulatory week of the year. Spoiler alert: Bots! 🤖

I hope you’re having a great week. I think i’d like to start with this amazing Tweet from Vikki Ross, in her best Carrie Bradshaw in advertising voice, “One couldn’t help but wonder…if AI is going to take our jobs, who’ll go to Cannes?”

And don’t look too closely at the image above, once you see the hand, there is no going back. But clutch job of Midjourney nailing the lanyard.

Luke warm rose take: There’s something funny to me just how many awards Cannes hands out. Canada alone scored 55 Lions this year. But when you give out awards for the same thing in multiple categories in Gold, Silver and Bronze, it all ads up. That’s Cannes math.

How are the Oscars only a miserable siege of over 3 hours, but Cannes is a four day marathon? It’s pretty telling that the top buzzy news out of the festival are Elon and the Kelce brothers. Don’t worry, I’m not going to get all Jerry Maguire on you. This is a newsletter, not a memo. “D’you know that bees and dogs can sell fear?”

Today’s “newsletter,” dives deep into this weeks Cannes Lions:

• We’ve got Cannes emails, airport ads and panel hot takes

• Barf bags, yachts, recycling Coke cans, and all the big winners

• We’ve also got hats and the history of punches for good measure

1. Cannes you need to calm down

My work week started early Monday by digging out my inbox and finding this completely over the top Cannes Lions email. Not sure how to put this delicately. History in the making? Giving out advertising awards in the South of France over delicious rose is not history making. It’s cool and all, but Cannes, you need to chill. And yes, so begins a week of nearly all-Cannes content.

2. Breaking: Popular Influencer hates AI on panel

Even these ads at Heathrow before you head to Cannes are everything you imagine a festival of creativity would come up with if it was made by AI and trying way to hard.

3. Breaking: Popular Influencer hates AI on panel

Love me some influencers like Tinx. She gets all the love on social for being “panel gold” by sharing the lukest-of-warm hot take that she hates AI. Whatttttt???? This is shocking.

Meanwhile even Elon was there, predicting a 10-20% probability of something terrible happening with AI but that the glass is 80% full and we should all be positive. Noted.

4.Even the Barf Bags Win Cannes Lions

Sometimes this industry makes things way too easy to criticize. Ad Age is there with the headline, “Dramamine’s mini-doc about airplane barf bags wins Health & Wellness Grand Prix.” Yes, that’s right, a nearly 14 minute documentary about barf bags just won an award. Don’t get me wrong, everything about this one was super fun, just not sure we needed the documentary.

5. Does your agency have a yacht at Cannes?

Is there an official yacht map of the Cannes Lions? Of course there is. Is your agency spending your retainer on yachts at Cannes? I’m not trying to be all Angel Reese looking over at Caitlin Clark here, but your agency should probably maybe not be spending their margins on yachts right now. The only yachts you need to worry about are on Bravo’s Below Deck.

6. But Cannes it be crushed?

I think the hottest take on any winner this week has to be from Copyranter, The Best Ad Critic In The World™ who mused, “Crushed Coke logos promoting recycling. Via the world's #1 with a bullet plastic polluter.”

7. Fine, here are the Cannes winners

Here’s all the big Grand Prix winners. This Handshake Hunt for Mercado Libre by Gut used AI to deliver Black Friday deals within TV content instead of commercial breaks is probably the most “wow” on the list. What do you think?

8. Couldn’t say it better myself

George Tannenbaum, who always has a lot of funny takes, boiled down this week’s Cannes 2024 content in 22 tight items that probably give you everything you need to know about the last 4 days. My personal favourite, “24 die in horrific lanyard accident.” Sounds about right.

9. Hat of the week: San Francisco Giants 1989 World Series Patch

In a week where Giants legend Willie Mays passed away just days before a game tonight at the oldest ballpark in America, Rickwood Field - which looks incredible. I spotted this Giants hat with the 1989 World Series patch.

Mays ways such a powerful force for the club well beyond his years on the field, and 1989 was such an epic run featuring my own favourite player at the time Will Clark. It was also the Series interrupted by the earthquake. Clark posted this wonderful quote from Mays, “They throw the ball, I hit it. They hit the ball, I catch it.”

10. Last call: The Drink Cart Cannes Punch

Here’s something I’ve never thought to much about. Punches. Where did they come from? Turns out (and this was verified by ChatGPT and Wikipedia, so you know it is 100% legit) punches were introduced from India to England by employees of the East India Company in the late 17th century.

Legend has it that the original, “paanch” might be from the Hindi word meaning five - since the drink so smartly had five simple ingredients (alcohol, sugar, juice, water and spices).

A contrary opinion put forward by David Wondrich in his book Punch is that it was actually for a 500 litre short barrel or cask called a Puncheon. Which sounds much cooler and links it to rum which makes a lot of sense. Wondrich adds this wonderful line, “But who knows. Most of the people who were drinking early punches were sailors and most of them were illiterate.”

The Drink Cart: Cannes Punch

• 4 oz Rose

• 1 oz Peach Schnapps

• 3 slices peaches and a few raspberries

• Top with Sparkling Water

Pro tip: Take the full bottle, make it 1 large cup of the peach stuff add in more fruit and throw that in a pitcher with some ice and sparkling water. And then you’ll probably be much like this 1732 painting by William Hogarth called A Midnight Modern Conversation.

If I was trying to tie it all together, the quote for this week about Cannes might be, “But who knows. Most of the people who were at Cannes were high on AI and most of them were just drunk on rose.”

Bottoms up! What did you think of this week’s newsletter? Drop me a comment or question below or tell me how your drink from the cart turned out.

The Drink Cart is a weekly newsletter of advertising, pop culture, baseball and cocktails from Jackson Murphy.